Search arguments – Run a search #

The search argument panel is the critical element in the search process. This panel consists of:

• Search selection dropdowns
• Search key
• Qualifiers
• Control buttons
• Navigation and Sorting

Search selection dropdowns #

A set of 5 selections in the form of combo – or drop-down – menu options form the search selection options, reflecting

• Council
• By
• Database
• Subset
• Item format

Search key #

Once the above options are selected, the search key may be entered.

• Truncation – only truncation is supported, using the asterisk as wildcard, e.g., biotech*
• Boolean operators – these are not supported in the basic search. Please use Advanced search for this.
• Inflectional – note the Inflectional checkbox below. With this selected, the search is automatically extended linguistically, e.g., for a noun this will search plurals as well (including irregular nouns, e.g., children, women); for a verb, all forms will be searched, e.g., act, acts, acted, acting, etc.

Qualifiers – Boleen #

Four qualifiers are provided that may be applied to the search key dependent on the search selection):

• Keyword (default): this tries to match the search key wherever the search terms appear – as random keywords.
• Exact match: the search will attempt to match the input term exactly: e.g., ‘Economics’ and display only such matches, ignoring all other titles containing the entered keyword.
• Starts with treats the search effectively as a browse but limiting results to those specifically matching the input key.
• Relevance: when Relevance is selected the results will be displayed according to a relevance weighting based on the term(s) entered and the occurrence of those terms in the results: the most apparently relevant first. This search will usually provide more search results than a keyword search.

See Search qualifiers for more technical detail on the operation of these options.

If the search selection is for Title, and the qualifier is either Exact Match or Starts with, then the results screen will show an additional column detailing any extra title attached to the work.

Note that the appearance of the qualifiers is dependent on the access point – so if a control number option is selected, e.g., ISBN, only ‘Exact match’ will be offered.

The total number of hits matching the search argument is shown below the Qualifiers.

Control Buttons #

A set of handy control buttons is provided to the right of the search entry box:

• Search Button –  This ‘magnifier’ button invokes the search.
  Note the small down arrow box to the right: this presents a number of options for directing the search:

• Local catalogue – the default, using your library resources.
• Remote catalogues (predefined) – generates a Z39.50 search.
• Google – generates a Google search.
• Google Scholar- generates a Google Scholar search.
• Trove – generates a Trove search.
  
  NOTE that the selection is NOT persistent – so if the Remote Catalogues option is selected, that will be used just for the current search, and then it will return to Local catalogue searching.

•  Clear – The wastepaper bin icon is used to clear the work input key box. Occasionally, the search key box may not be selectable by mouse, but clicking this icon will allow clearance, in readiness for entry of a new search key.
• Spell Check   This button performs an explicit spell-check

Two checkbox is placed below. This controls.

• More Filters – Additional combo menus and checkboxes
• Show Items – Shows or hides the  item results panel below the work results

Note that this checkbox has a ‘persistent’ setting – that is, if set on, it will remain on for the operator/workstation. So, you can set the screen to your preferred layout as far as these elements are concerned.

Navigation and Sorting #

When results are displayed, they may be split over a number of ‘pages’, and this panel allows the next, previous, or a specific page to be selected.

Hits/page – A control is provided to set the number of results to be displayed per page. This has a default value of 20; it may be set (up to a value of 99) and will then be persistent (on the specific workstation only)

Sort Works – Results may be sorted both by title, and within title by item characteristics, All title results may be sorted as required using a pull-down combo menu – the sort can be preselected, or selected after the results have been delivered, to allow a redisplay.
NOTE – A checkbox allows the sort to be Ascending [A-Z and the default] or Descending [Z-A]

• Name
• Title [Default]
• Publication date
• Publisher
• Series
• ISBN
• Classification number [Note that call number prefixes may be counted as part of the classification, and that numbers file before letters]
  

Sort Items – A secondary combo menu is provided to allow the sorting of items within the specific title results. Note that the sort does not apply to serials parts which have their own sorting mechanisms.

• Availability (default)
• Item format
• Call number
• Local Library first (then alphabetical by name)
• Council (only shown if a consortium – then alphabetically by council and within that by library)
• Library (alphabetical by name

Title searching #

When searching By Title, and Search Qualifiers Exact Match or Starts With are selected, then search results will show an additional column, displaying the additional title column

Duplicated title entries #

When searching with ‘Starts with’, both main and alternative titles are displayed, and this may result is apparent duplicates being presented. You may also see titles seeming to be out of sequence – this is because the secondary title is then used as the filing title. If an alternative title is displayed in this way, it will be flagged with a small ‘pair of dice’  icon: 

Alternative titles #

Where a record has additional titles (in MARC tags 246 – Alternative title; 240 – Uniform title; 740 – Added title, etc.) then these are displayed by default in results (for all search types). If the query is large (e.g. for a common word as a keyword in title, then the search results will take a little longer to present than if the alternative titles are suppressed: the display of alternative titles can be suppressed by a checkbox option in ‘Show more filters’.

Please also note that a GMD added to a title will cause an exact match of the title proper to fail

Relevance ranking #

If Relevance is selected when searching, then search results are evaluated in terms of their match against the entered term(s), and are displayed in the order of match value, to show the most relevant first. To make things easier to follow, colour coding is applied to reflect the level of relevance from green (high) down to grey (low):

Summary Panel #

As a title is selected (by mouse or up and down arrow keys), a summary is displayed to the right of the results details [unless the checkbox option to Suppress the summary has been selected]; where text in the summary matches your search term(s), that text is highlighted [this is optional and can be switched off using the checkbox option Suppress match highlight]. If an image of the work’s cover is available, then this will be displayed here:

Also optionally, search words can be highlighted in the display. The summary will indicate the number of items, and how many are immediately available (i.e. they are not on loan and do not have an item status other than ‘normal’), with a statement below, showing the branch and location of available copies. If the title has reservations, a tally will be shown.

Summary – Button Bar #

The summary also contains a small button bar with four command buttons:

•  Enables the operator to place a reserve on the work
•  Creates a results list of works other people have borrowed of the same format as the initially displayed title. So, if this is the book ‘Da Vinci Code’ this links to information on other books read by the same borrowers that have read the Da Vinci Code book, and disregards borrowers of the DVD, etc.
•  Creates a results list of works other people have borrowed in all formats. So, if the title searched is ‘Da Vinci Code’, the options allow you to follow the links for Book or DVD (dependent on the entry selected initially) or to see what people borrowed, regardless of the Da Vinci Code format.
•  Magnifies the thumbnail of the cover image

Note that if the work has not been borrowed, the links to other borrowings will not be offered. If there is no thumbnail image, the magnification button is suppressed.

Results from Requests Links #

Note that Search Results may also be generated from a list of Requests (for Homebound/Library of the Blind users) – and in this case, the record details have been used to populate the list. Display controls operate as normally, but the search argument will remain blank and cannot be modified, without return to the list of Requests.

Extended information #

If fuller details of the selected work are required, then when the title is selected, you can move to the Details of a work tab for extended information, covering details of reserves and requests, linked headings and URLs, and bibliographic notes.

Item Detail Results #

Items attached to a work that has been selected in the work results table displayed in a further panel below

Item Result columns available

Note that the status of each item is shown, including the specific item status, such as Missing or Lost; in-transit information; and a clear statement if the item is on loan, or is to be found on the shelf.

Items Results – Right click pop-up menu #

• Reserve Item
• Apply a Hold (trap immediately)
  NOTE a hold can only be applied on item currently on shelf and may be set up to have different conditions to reserves e.g. charges
• Reserve Work (trap first incoming item)
• Manually allocate item to Picking List
• View Item Details
• Transfer item
  • Permanent transfer
  • Temporary transfer
• Drop into Your Box of items
• Label print
  • Allowing selection of ‘Spine label’

Magazine issues #

If the item selected is a magazine issue, Aurora will not allow a link for Reserve Work – the reservation must be item specific.
If reserve item is selected then the ‘Item Specific’ checkbox is ticked, and the tick cannot be removed.

Refine Search #

A powerful option for search refinement can be enabled by checkbox options: as well as providing information on the actual titles satisfying the query, Aurora Desktop also gives detail on the additional formats and headings associated with the titles subset. That is, when a search is made, the results can be immediately refined by selection of shared elements, to allow immediate focus on relevant materials.

For instance, for the example search above made on ‘dream’, the Union returns all the titles including the word ‘dream’, and additionally provides the following refinement options:

Options are presented in two separate boxes:

General
The General list of refinements includes information linked from shared coded data elements, to allow identification of common elements such as:

• Format
• Target audience

• Biography
• Language

Authors, subjects, etc.
This separate list of refinements provides a summary of all the navigation links held in all the records in the results set, allowing immediate options to narrow the search focus

How to navigate the refinements #

Each refinement is presented as a hyperlink, and clicking the link will take you to a new display focussed on that specific heading. Note that the display of refinements will of course change accordingly. You can select further refinements as appropriate, and can navigate backwards using the controls above and below the Refinement listings:

where ‘<<‘ will take you back to the start point of Refinement navigation, and ‘<‘ will step back to the previous level.

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